Estimating the Economic Value of the East Sea Beach Using Individual Travel Cost Method

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to estimate the economic value of beaches which are the major part of the East Sea Coast. ITCM (Individual Travel Cost Method) is applied to estimate the economic value of its beaches using Poisson, negative binomial, truncated Poisson and truncated negative binomial models. The consumer surplus during length of stay per capita is 214,088 won in beaches overall on the East Sea Coast, 206,398 won in Gangwon-do beaches and 271,171 won in Gyeongbuk/Ulsan beaches. Annual total economic value of its beaches considering the number of visitors at beaches is 6,269 billion won (3,970 billion won in Kangwondo beaches, 2,299 billion won in Kyungbuk/Ulsan beaches).